7 Key Time Management Skills to Share with Your Employees
When an employer looks for good skills in their employee, they are not just watching for hard talents like being able to navigate through the computer system. Soft skills are just as important, and sometimes even more so. Being able to effectively manage your time is a soft skill that employers desire in their staff because ultimately it streamlines the work and increases the company’s bottom line.
Effective time management results in deadlines made, customers satisfied, regular hours without added overtime due to ineffective work in normal hours, and much more. When your employees are staying busy with productive work, it also results in job satisfaction.
Because of all of these important aspects of this skill, it’s crucial that you train your employees on how to manage their time wisely. Here are 7 key time management skills that you need to share with your staff today.
Time Management Skills Every Employee Should Have
Truthfully, these are great skills for employers to have, too, so as you are teaching your staff, be sure you utilize these strategies for productivity yourself!
Plan ahead.
When your employee walks into work each day, they should know exactly what needs to be done. Setting daily, weekly, monthly, and long-term goals is important to enhanced productivity.
Work with each of your employees to help them learn how to set goals, create a realistic timeline for each goal, and then break it down into manageable tasks. It’s also a great idea for you to provide your staff with time management tools like synced calendars across the company, task organization apps, and other programs that will help them to manage their time. Discover more ways to streamline time management with a little online research.
Learn how to differentiate priorities.
While everything must get done eventually, employees need to learn how to tell the difference between what is on the hot burner and needs to be completed before it starts a fire and what is simmering nicely waiting for its turn.
In order for them to learn how to prioritize, many people have to have this skill modeled for them. In a new job, it’s difficult to automatically know what is urgent and what can wait, especially since some tasks, if delayed today, will result in urgent fires tomorrow.
Organization is crucial.
Maybe you have that employee that swears they are organized in a disorganized way. They have junk all over their desk but they know exactly where the item they need is. In the long run, this is not effective.
When someone has to spend time trying to find an important document or item that’s needed, even a few seconds adds up. There’s a saying, “A cluttered desk is a cluttered mind,” and that goes for workspace as well. Make this a big point in your company and follow through on ensuring your employees understand the importance of organization, too.
Understand how to handle tasks efficiently.
Most jobs have regular components that are dealt with daily. Employees need to know how to handle those tasks in the most efficient manner so they are not wasting time every day on unnecessary repetition.
Communication is important.
One of the biggest complaints that employees have about their employers is lack of communication. The only feedback that the staff gets in many companies is when they make a mistake.
As an employer, you must open a dedicated line of communication between you and your employee, letting them know exactly what needs to be done to complete a task you have assigned and allowing them the ability to communicate with you to ask questions and make suggestions along the way.
Learn how to create an uninterrupted space.
When you are working on a deadline, it’s important to be able to manage interruptions professionally. Turning off your phone and emails, hanging a sign on your door asking for no interruptions, and checking all lines of communication before beginning work on your important project are all key ways to create an uninterrupted space.
Limiting distractions by having an organized desk is also integral to this time management skill, since having to stop to find the next thing you need or being distracted by post-it notes reminding you of yet another deadline or item on your to-do list is all part of time lost and deadlines missed, as well.
Create a personal life/work/health balance.
Some employers are pleased with and reward employees who put their whole life into being productive at their job. They work first thing in the morning to the end of the day, allowing just enough time to stumble home and catch a few hours of sleep before repeating the schedule the next day.
As an employer, you need to talk to your staff about the importance of a healthy balance between personal lives and work. You may have a company that has urgent deadlines and constant pressure, but if your employee is working into a slow early death, they won’t be very good for you in the long run.
Your company should encourage their staff to take regular 10-minute rest breaks and an hour lunch break through the day, eat healthily and get outside into the sunshine or exercise for at least a few minutes every day, and schedule a balance of time to have a personal life.
Without these important parts of each person’s daily life, employees end up stressed and burnt out, or their bodies begin to lag and performance deteriorates quickly, sometimes without warning.
Time Management is Good for the Whole Company
When your staff is effectively managing their own time, it frees you up to do the jobs you need to do without having to micromanage everyone. It gives the employees the satisfaction of knowing that they are able to productively get the job done with your trust in them and helps the company to flow well overall.
Take the time early on with each employee to help them develop good time management skills, and the reward will pay off exponentially during the course of their employment.
If managing time on your own seems like a difficult task, you may get advice from others or sign up for hands-on time management training. You will learn how to evaluate the use of time, identify goals and set priorities, develop an overall time management plan and much more.
